ST. JOHN: SABLE ISLAND. 9 



issued in 1578. " Biggar tells us 1 that "he did not set sail until 1584. 

 Unfortunately his largest vessel with over one hundred colonists on 

 board was wrecked near Brouague and the voyage had to be aban- 

 doned." 



"In that year [1598] he set out with one small vessel, under Chef 

 d'hotel, a distinguished Norman pilot. * * * His expedition was 

 so modest, not to say cheap, in its proportion and equipment as to 

 seem quite unworthy of its ambitious mission, or the vice-regal rank 

 of its commander. One vessel constituted the fleet, and it is so small, 

 that, according to a contemporary chronicle, you could wash your 

 hands in the water without leaving the deck, while forty out of the 

 sixty men comprising the marquis' army of occupation and evangel- 

 ization, were convicts chosen from the royal prisons/' 2 



Biggar, who has investigated many of the old archives, gives us a 

 somewhat different account. He quotes the contract made in March, 

 1597, between la Roche and Chefdostel, master of the La Catherine 

 of 170 tons. Chefdostel was to transport a company of soldiers to 

 Sable Island on condition that la Roche should pay for half the car- 

 go of salt, half the wages of the crew, and the whole of the provisions. 

 A year later la Roche, failing to attract bonafide colonists, was allow- 

 ed to take convicts from the jails of Brittany and Normandy. On 

 the 16th of March, 1598, la Roche made a new contract with Chef- 

 dostel who for 600 crowns was to transport the convicts to Sable Is- 

 land. Two days later a similar contract was made with Jehan Girot, 

 master of the Frangoise, who having a smaller vessel was to receive 

 100 crowns. 



The Marquis de la Roche obtained 200 or 250 convicts, male and 

 female, from the prisons, but it appears that he allowed many of these 

 to purchase their freedom before sailing. He set sail in 1 598 and on reach- 

 ing Sable Island landed 40, 50, or 60 of the convicts, 3 leaving with 

 them a small supply of provisions and goods; then he sailed away to 



1 Biggar, H. P.: The Early Trading Companies of New France, 39 (1901). 



2 Oxley, J. M.: Mag. of Amer. Hist. xv. 166 (1886). 



3 Charlevoix, P. F. X. : Histoire et Description de la Nouvelle France, i. 109 

 (1744), says 40 convicts were landed; Gosselin, E. : Early French Voyages to 

 Newfoundland, Mag. Am. Hist. viii. 288 (1882), says that the colonists "with 

 the exception of fifty, refused to disembark, and compelled de la Roche to 

 bring them back to France"; Biggar, H. P. : The Early Trading Companies 

 of New France, 40 (1901), says that only sixty persons were actually landed on 

 the island. 



